Free Republic

WASHINGTON — After 18 months of careful image-making and bipartisanship, Michelle Obama is shifting course as first lady, stepping up her policy agenda and dipping into election-year politics to campaign and raise money for Democrats. Despite stinging criticism of her summer vacation to Spain with daughter Sasha — aides warned her not to go, and the backlash was fiercer than they had imagined — Mrs. Obama is the most popular member of her husband’s administration. Having worked to build good will through nonideological causes like fighting obesity and assisting military families, aides say, she is ready to spend some of...

EXCERPT “I think she’s happy to go out and support folks who have stood up for things that she thinks are important,” said David Axelrod, Mr. Obama’s senior adviser. “But I don’t think she’s eager to jump into the fray in a very political way, and I don’t think she will.” With her husband’s poll numbers sliding, and many Democrats distancing themselves from him, Mrs. Obama, political analysts say, is the White House’s best hope for exciting the party’s lethargic base. “Her favorability is the highest of anybody we’ve got on the Democratic side right now,” said Celinda Lake, a...